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Additionally, if you buy a TV in certain high street shops, they will inform the TV Licencing Authority of your new purchase on your behalf, so that they know to have a look at their records and start sending you letters.
I also read about a couple of situations where people who had no TVs at all were getting at least one letter every month, couched in intimidating 'you are in deep shit' type language, and threatening this that and the other. The only way they could get the letters to stop - and then only temporarily - is if they allowed an 'enforcement officer' into their home to check that they weren't using a TV. I believe that the Licencing Authority now sub-contracts this part of their operation to a security agency.
There's a lot of good things to say about the BBC, but there's a lot of bad things too. For every wonderful and marvellous drama or documentary, there's about 30,000 episodes of eastenders. There's all those many many antique-selling programmes, and don't forget the 'Changing Rooms' explosion of a couple of years back. Oh, and Fame Academy, Strictly Night Fever, Celebrity Fame Academy. Oh and what about this one... Bring Your Husband To Heel - the show that teaches women how to use dog-training techniques on their men.
People are always harping on about the quality of the BBC, sometimes I have to ask myself why?
In the end, I suppose It's not necessarily a bad system, but the way its enforced is just harsh. I guess if people weren't always trying to evade it...
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